I started this thread because of all the crazy excuses we hear.
But now that brings up another question - What do all of you do
when kids miss for no good reason? Do you have an attendance policy?
For one of my teams this year we have had the worst attendance ever!!
We sent out countless emails to parents stressing the importance of being at
practice. We were coming close to our first comp. so about 2 weeks before
we sent an email and said that if anyone misses any practices from now
til our first comp. we would have to take them out of the routine.
Well 2 girls missed & we replaced both of them. As hard as that was,
it changed everyones attitudes & attendance is soo much better now!
We calculated percentages for everyones attendance for about a 7 month period (90 practices in total). Of that, the average was abour 82-85% for each individual.. However, our percentage for 100% attendance at practice was only at 15%! :eek: (At around 14 practices of the total 90 we were complete with everyone there).
We passed out letters for the parents and kids so that everyone could see how things were... Needless to say, we had a few parents come to us about how the kids now feel under pressure to not miss practice etc. Um yea, that's kind of the point???? :confused: And how the parents were offended because they try so hard to get their kids to practice etc etc.
A few of the kids even argued with us that they hadn't missed that much practice and the percentage had to be wrong. -.-
We have since created team rules and a point system, e.g. 2 points for 100% attendance in a months period, 1 point for no unexcused absences, -1 point for excused absence, -2 for unexcused etc.
Sadly, things haven't gotten much better, as we haven't had a practice with everyone since we passed out those papers... :mad:
But, it's kind of hard because club sports are completely different here in Germany than in the US. So it's like a different world for me :D Cheerleading isn't as expensive as in the US - basically anyone can come and go as they please and pay in our club 10 EUR/month as a member. So there's definitely a problem within the team that some of the kids see if more of as a hobby rather than a team sport and the importance of being there so that we can get our routine in shape rather than 2 people are missing and therefore 2 stunt groups can't practice and then an entire pyramid sequence.